


Give Me a Reason

by morganoconner



Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-09
Updated: 2010-01-09
Packaged: 2017-10-18 06:00:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,218
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/185769
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/morganoconner/pseuds/morganoconner
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gabriel finally makes the choice that’s been before him for a millennia</p>
            </blockquote>





	Give Me a Reason

He follows, always keeping them in sight though he remains hidden from their eyes. He is at first deeply perplexed by his brother’s inability to detect him, and then saddened to realize that Castiel has already Fallen so far.

As he follows, he spends a good amount of time thinking on Dean Winchester’s words to him… _This is about you not being able to stand up to your family._ He is unsettled to find that the longer he runs the words through his mind, the truer they seem.

Though he watches all three of them when they are together, or the Winchesters alone whenever Castiel departs with a clue to finding their Father, mostly, he finds himself drawn to watching Sam. The youngest Winchester presents a puzzle to him. Though he compared him to Lucifer back in the warehouse the day his true identity was revealed, the truth is that he’s nothing like Gabriel’s younger brother.

Lucifer walked away from Heaven and his Father and brothers and never looked back except through the eyes of someone greedy enough to want to take over. Sam walked away to try and live a normal life, but also to escape the constant fighting. That, Gabriel can relate to. And when his family needed him the most, Sam was there. Lucifer would never swallow his pride deep enough to allow himself the same.

There are parallels between the two, obviously, but Gabriel finds himself more and more troubled when he realizes that truly, Sam couldn’t be more different than Lucifer.

-666-

The first time he enters Sam’s dreams, it’s a genuine accident, but you’ll be hard-pressed to get him to admit that later. Neither of his personas have ever been known for making mistakes… _Accidents_ don’t happen to either the Trickster or the Archangel, ever.

Still, somehow, one day when he stretches his senses to try and get a read on the younger Winchester’s emotional state, he trip-tumbles headlong into his dream.

He counts himself lucky that he at least had the presence of mind to keep himself concealed, because even disregarding himself, it’s immediately obvious that Sam is not alone in his own head.

“How long will you make me wait, Sam” Lucifer asks, and in this illusion, he’s wearing Sam’s dead girlfriend. Even for someone who has seen and done as much as Gabriel has, that seems like a bit much, in his opinion.

“As long as I have to,” is the reply, and this is the first time Sam Winchester truly surprises the archangel Gabriel. He is not angry or resigned or scared, or any of the other things he _should_ be. Instead, he stands calm and unafraid, sure of himself here and now in a way he never has been before. He is every inch the righteous man in this moment that his brother has always been.

Lucifer is angry, an emotion Gabriel has felt from him more times than he cares to remember, but it’s hard to tell that just from looking at him. He is smirking, the expression an alien one on the face he wears. “We’ll see,” he says simply, and vanishes.

Gabriel stays long enough to see Sam close his eyes and breathe deeply as his mouth quirks into a small, satisfied smile, and then he too leaves, feeling more confused and unsure than ever before.

-666-

The next time he enters Sam’s dreams, it is decidedly _not_ an accident. He’s been keeping an eye on the hunter at night, monitoring him to detect the next time Lucifer visits, and it only takes his brother a week. Patience has never been a virtue he possesses, no matter how he tries to make himself seem. The second Gabriel feels Sam’s guardedness spike, he closes his eyes and steps into his dream.

He knows instantly that he was not careful enough. Though he is carefully hidden from Sam himself, Lucifer, this time disguised as Dean Winchester, tenses and looks directly at him. He says nothing, though, and although Gabriel knows he should leave _now_ and definitely not return _ever_ , he stands transfixed.

“The answer is still no,” Sam says, eyes hard.

“It won’t always be,” Lucifer replies, maddeningly sure of himself.

“I _will_ kill myself before I ever say yes to you. And I’ll find a way to make sure it’s lasting.”

Lucifer smiles, teeth gleaming, and Gabriel can’t help it…something about that expression makes him step forward, ready to reach out and wake Sam, anything to take him out of there. The smile vanished, becomes a raised eyebrow as Sam stands unmoving. “Be careful you don’t do something you’ll regret, brother,” he says.

“You’re not my brother,” Sam growls, but Gabriel knows it wasn’t to him that Lucifer was really speaking.

-666-

Over time, grudging respect turns into true admiration. Gabriel, who long ago stopped believing in much of anything, finds his faith slowly being restored as he watches Sam battle with a destiny he does not want and will not accept. It stops being a chore, or simply something to pass the time, watching Sam, and starts being something he _wants_ to do. In fact, he starts to feel a little lost if he _doesn’t_ spend part of each day watching the hunter.

And it’s through watching Sam that Gabriel learns about humanity as a whole, about what makes them so special, what makes them so worthy of his Father’s love. If one man can so thoroughly alter his own fate for the good of a world that has given him so little, what could mankind as a whole accomplish under the right circumstances? Gabriel suddenly finds his entire view of the world altered in ways that should terrify him. As an archangel, he was always detached from the world God had created. As the Trickster, he only spent his time watching those who were…deserving of his attention. Now, as some hybrid of the two who has become attached to one of these creatures he never understood before, he can’t help but see the world as a whole, as it should be, and as it _is_.

Gabriel has been on earth for a very, very long time, and he’s not nearly as clueless as the rest of the angels are about human emotions. Bound to a single vessel as he is, he’s quite familiar with them, in fact. But he’ll be damned before he admits exactly what it is he’s beginning to feel for Sam Winchester.

Until he has no other choice.

-666-

The third time he enters Sam’s dreams, Lucifer is standing looking like himself…or rather, his vessel, Nick. Complete with peeling, blistering skin. His hands are clasped, and he regards Sam with an expression that can only be described as _hurt_.

“Sam, it saddens me that you truly believe I don’t have your best interests at heart. I’ve never lied to you, never done anything except try to explain my side of the story. Whereas my brothers have hurt you, lied to you, tortured you and Dean in ways that are so cruel they put my reputation to shame. I need your _help_ , Sam. Why do you still deny me?”

There is a strange power crackling around Lucifer that Gabriel recognizes only in the vaguest sense as something old and dangerous, and he has materialized before he even realizes it, moving closer to Sam as Lucifer’s gaze zeroes in on him and his lips twist in a mockery of a smile.

“Gabriel. I should have known you were lurking about once again.” His gaze goes back to the hunter and his smirk widens. “I gather you didn’t realize you had your own angel stalker?” he asks, taking in Sam’s wide-eyed gaze that has focused on Gabriel.

“What the _hell_ are you doing here?” Sam asks, his voice low and shocked.

The archangel-turned-Trickster doesn’t answer, too busy staring down his little brother. He swallows, a very human response to the fear and adrenaline coursing through him as he wonders himself what the hell he thinks he _is_ doing, and Lucifer must notice it, because he throws his head back and laughs.

“You’ve really stepped into it now, brother, haven’t you? I’ll give you a very small reprieve, because I don’t think you really _meant_ to challenge me here. You’ve been in hiding all of these years for a reason. Don’t let yourself forget that.” His gaze swivels back again to Sam. “I’ll be back. We’ll talk more.” And back to Gabriel. “Think carefully, Gabriel.” And then he’s gone, and Gabriel’s eyes close, his breath shaky.

Sam take two steps toward him, takes his arm in a bruising grip and spins him so that he’s facing the angry hunter. When Gabriel looks up at him, Sam’s eyes are smoldering. “What are you _doing_ here, Gabriel? How did you even find us?” Gabriel doesn’t answer, and in a burst of sudden clarity, Sam’s eyes go wide again. “Have you been following us since Willington?”

Gabriel tries not to look shifty, and then decides, _to hell with it_. “Yes,” he mutters.

“Why?” Sam growls. “What possible reason could you have? You won’t get me to say yes to Lucifer, you _won’t_.”

“I know.” Gabriel’s eyes slide down as he admits, “I don’t want that anymore.”

Sam’s brow furrows, and his grip loosens. “Then what _do_ you want? Why are you _here?_ ”

When Gabriel looks back up at him, he _knows_ his expression is tortured, and there’s not a damn thing he can do about it. Every defense he had is gone. “I don’t know,” he whispers, and frees himself from the dream before Sam can question him further.

-666-

It’s two weeks later, and Gabriel hasn’t seen the Winchesters or Castiel since that day. He has thrown himself from one place to another, trying to get a grip on whatever is going on in his head and his heart. He is sitting on top of a pyramid in Giza, leaning back on his hands, face tilted upward toward the sun, when he feels a tug from somewhere deep inside him, a place he thought was long dead.

Someone is calling for him. Someone needs his help. And instinctively, he _knows_ that it’s Sam. Faster then the blink of an eye, he’s flying.

When he finds him, the hunter is in a dark, moonlit alleyway in Sacramento, fighting for his life against seven demons. Gabriel doesn’t hesitate, doesn’t even pause to consider the ramifications of what he’s about to do. He yells, “Close your eyes!” and doesn’t even give himself enough time to make sure Sam followed his order before he slashes the knife he carries through the mark hidden on his vessel’s arm, releasing the binding he himself placed on it so long ago and allowing his true form to burst free for the first time in a millennia.

When it’s over, and there are seven empty bodies scattered on the ground around them, and Sam is lying with his face pressed to the ground, arm over his head to shield himself, it takes every ounce of willpower he has to reign himself in and force his essence back into the vessel that has never seemed so small. His teeth are clenched, his breathing ragged as he kneels on the ground, head bent, hands fisted, eyes shut tightly.

“Gabriel?”

Sam’s voice is hesitant. Gabriel takes a few more deep breaths, forces his eyes open. The world suddenly seems too bright, too sharp, too _everything_. He didn’t give up his powers when he became the Trickster, didn’t need to sacrifice his grace, but being bound as he was so the angels couldn’t sense him had still cost him. He had been cut off from the Host, cut off from many things that had made him what he was up until that point. Having it all returned to him now is a shock, one he’s not sure he’s ready for.

But then he looks at Sam, who is kneeling next to him, hand outstretched, cautious and uncertain, and he thinks, _maybe I am_.

Something in his expression seems to register with Sam, because his own face clears and his hand presses down on Gabriel’s shoulder. “Are you okay?” he asks. “Those demons… Lucifer sent them to capture me. Apparently, he’s given up on his games. What…just happened?”

Gabriel takes another breath, releases it slowly this time. “I just openly declared a side in this war. I just told my brother to go screw himself.”

Sam shakes his head, bewildered. “Why would you do that, Gabriel? After all this time?”

Gabriel doesn’t take his eyes from Sam’s as he replies, “Because he can’t have you, damn it. I won’t allow it.”

“But why the sudden change of heart?” Sam demands, and it strikes Gabriel that some part of him must know.

His eyebrow quirks upward, and he manages a lopsided smile…not quite Trickster-worthy, but at least honest. “Because I don’t share the things I love with snot-nosed baby brothers.” And then he is leaning forward, hand moving to tilt Sam’s head down. Sam goes willingly, and then his lips are pressed to the hunter’s, kissing him firmly, possessively. _Mine_ , he says clearly without words.

Sam doesn’t seem inclined to argue the point anytime soon.


End file.
